Introducing the qr-cow dashboard: dynamic codes, scan analytics, and an MCP server

qr-cow just grew up. You can now create a free account to save every code you make, watch the scans roll in on a real analytics dashboard, and — if you need codes you can edit after printing — flip on Dynamic for $3 a month. The API and MCP server for developers and AI agents are live today too.

Here is everything that changed, and what stayed exactly the same.

Free accounts — a home for your QR codes

Until now, every QR code you made lived only in your browser. Close the tab and it was gone. Fine for a one-off; painful if you make codes regularly. So we shipped free accounts.

Sign in once and you get:

• A library of every QR you save — colours, frames, logos, content type, everything.
• Re-download any time in PNG (up to 2000 px), SVG (sharp at any size), or JPG.
• One profile, every browser. Your saved styles and codes follow you across devices.
• Server-saved studio defaults. Name the look you like ("Café orange", "Brand navy") and the studio loads it every time.

Accounts are free, unlimited, and optional. The anonymous studio still works with no sign-in at all — accounts just give your codes somewhere to live.

Dynamic codes — change the destination after you print

The single biggest limitation of a static QR is that once you print it, the destination is locked. Wrong link on 500 flyers? Reprint everything.

Dynamic codes fix that. From the save dialog in the studio, pick Dynamic instead of Static. You get:

• Editable destinations. The printed pattern stays the same; the link behind it is yours to update from your dashboard any time.
• Real scan analytics. Total scans, unique scans (salted-hash IPs, never raw), country, device, OS, browser, and an hour-of-day heatmap so you know when your audience is actually scanning.
• Last-20 scan log per code — a quick sanity check that the campaign is firing as expected.

Dynamic codes are $3 a month. Cancel anytime — your dynamic codes keep redirecting and the analytics dashboard goes read-only when the billing period ends. Nothing locks you in.

An API and an MCP server — for the developers

If you'd rather not click through a studio, the API and MCP server are here too.

• REST API — mint QR codes, manage dynamic destinations, pull scan analytics. Works from curl, Python, Node, Go, Ruby, PHP — anything that speaks HTTP. Same auth as the dashboard via a personal access token.
• Model Context Protocol server — plug qr-cow into Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, or Zed. Your AI agent can generate QR codes natively without copy-pasting between tools. As far as we know, qr-cow is the first generator with first-class MCP support.

API access is included on the Growth tier ($9/month) — covers unlimited dynamic codes plus API + MCP. See pricing for the full split.

Static codes are still 100 percent free — forever

This is the important part. Nothing about the free studio got worse.

Static QR codes encode the data directly in the pattern — there's no server cost per code, so we never need to charge for them. Unlimited static codes, every content type, custom colours and gradients, centre logos, high-res downloads, no watermark, no daily limit, no signup: all still free, exactly as before.

Dynamic codes, accounts, and the API exist for the things the free tool genuinely can't do — edit after printing, see scans, integrate with code. Everything else stays free because there's no reason for it not to be.

What about privacy?

The whole product is built around not being a surveillance tool. So:

• Anonymous QR generation still happens entirely in your browser. We never see what you encode unless you save it to your account.
• Scan analytics use a salted hash of the IP, never the raw address. We can count unique visitors per code; we can't deanonymise them, even if we wanted to.
• No third-party tracking pixels on the analytics dashboard.
• Billing is crypto-only (USDT, BTC, ETH) — your payment never touches a bank or a credit-card processor that could resell the data.

How to get started

Just want a QR code? Nothing changed — open the studio and download. No account needed.

Want to save your designs? Create a free account with your email.

Need editable codes and scan stats? Sign in, save a code, pick Dynamic — $3/month, cancel anytime.

Building with code? The API + MCP docs have you covered.

We've been heads-down on this for a while and we're glad it's finally in your hands. Got a feature request? Reply on LinkedIn — that's where the roadmap conversations happen.